Editorial April 11, 1903 Issue

A religious life must always precede religious statement...

W.

A Religious life must always precede religious statement and phenomena, and this important point was cleverly stated by the unknown writer who has said that "Somebody must be religious before anybody can be a theologian. But after religious experiences have been observed, studied, classified, accounted for, one can be a theologian at second hand without being religious at all."

Great religious movements have always been the out growth of a deeply spiritual life, and this fact presents a most perplexing problem to those who are disposed to question the truth of the gospel delineation of the person and character of Jesus. It is far more difficult to account for the exalted ideal and teaching of the Gospels without the historical Nazarene than with him, and hence questioning unbelief must make the larger demand upon the world's credulity.

Some of the critics of Christian Science have forgotten this fact, and in their questioning of the inspiration and spiritual wisdom of the Founder and Leader of Christian Science they have apparently failed to realize that their position, in the presence of the undeniable phenomena of this movement, precipitates a problem for which they offer and can offer no solution, since it contains mutually contradictory factors. The presence of a devout understanding which heals the sick and quickness and exalts the spiritual life, is beyond all question, and that this high and effective degree of spiritual perception should have been reached by one of ordinary spiritual attainment is simply self-contradictory.

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April 11, 1903
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